


The Shoddy Facsimile of Home

by sanctum_c



Series: Endless Summer 2019 - Cloti Flavour [3]
Category: Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Beaches, F/M, Mechanics, Missing Scene, Tiny Bronco, Walks On The Beach, Wutai (Compilation of FFVII)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-28
Updated: 2019-06-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:34:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27781579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanctum_c/pseuds/sanctum_c
Summary: A delay in Wutai while Cid fixes the Tiny Bronco.
Relationships: AVALANCHE & AVALANCHE (Compilation of FFVII), Tifa Lockhart/Cloud Strife
Series: Endless Summer 2019 - Cloti Flavour [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2032405
Kudos: 3





	The Shoddy Facsimile of Home

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt 'Day at the beach'

Returning to the Tiny Bronco was a much more sedate experience than leaving it. No ninja with every piece of materia on her person fleeing headlong for Wutai for example. Yuffie seemed a little more sombre on the return trip; whether guilt over the theft, repeated subterfuges or the fight against her father, Tifa could not guess. She chattered away, walking in between Aeris and Vincent.

Cid was out in front, setting a tough pace. Uncomfortable since leaving his damaged plane on the beach when they washed ashore, forever convinced the tide would have washed the craft back out and leaving them stranded – or forcing them to trail back to the capital city and hope they real did have enough of an in with the royal family to get them something for the mean-time. Fortunately the Tiny Bronco remained where it landed, above the tide-line and for now safe. Cid let out an excited whoop and ran down to the vehicle.

By the time Tifa and the rest of Avalanche reached him, various hatches lay open, both engines partially disassembled and Cid was smoking. Immediate instinct was to remind him of the risks of fire near fuel-sources. But Cid had survived this long – somehow – and Tifa let the issue slide. “How long until you get her fixed?”

“’Fixed’?” Cid shot Cloud a surprised look. “Bronco’ll never fly again.”

A plummeting sensation in Tifa’s stomach. Were they trapped? “Never?”

Cid shook his head. “Not without completely rebuilding.”

Somewhere behind her, Aeris was murmuring something along the lines of this situation never occurring if they had stolen the plane when she originally suggested it. Yuffie seemed eager to learn some of the details regarding hotwiring and Aeris’s shady past came up again when she offered to teach her- “But-“ Cloud tried.

“She’ll float though.” Cid knocked a fist against the fuselage. “And I can get the engines to push us at least. Should get us back to the other coast if nothing else.”

Relief. “Will that take long?”

“Assuming-“ He fixed Yuffie with a stare. “-no interference, I reckon we can head off in about three hours.” He glanced around at the group. “Find some way to amuse yourselves.” He pulled his goggles down over his eyes and diverted all his attention to the engine interior.

Aeris found a sunny spot on the beach and spread out, speculating idly about if there was enough time to get changed to REALLY enjoy the sun. Yuffie busied her hands with a small pile of materia – Barret took the opportunity to double-check his own. Vincent brooded beneath the shadow of the nearby cliffs. Cait Sith – as was typical in similar situations – went into a slightly frustrating loop. Jaunty music, offered fortunes and dancing until Cid ordered the robot a good distant away or he would reprogram him with his spear.

Nanaki raced along the coastline in the same direction, easily outpacing Cait Sith. Leaving Cloud and Tifa. His hands kept clenching, eyes focused on Cid’s actions. Did Cloud want to help? Shame Cid had made clear he wanted no input from the rest of them. Perhaps best to get him away; head the other way up the beach. First chance they’d had to talk alone since before Nibelheim.

“Cloud? Want to keep me company?” Her voice shook him out of his reverie.

“Sure.”

She headed away from the craft with a glance at her watch to note the time, Cloud keeping pace. The sounds of Avalanche faded behind them – Barret accusing Yuffie of another heist, Cid shouting for quiet – lost beneath the wash of the tide on the sand and distance. “Going home. Was hard.”

“Yeah.” Cloud swallowed. “I couldn’t believe it.” Nor could some of their companions who questioned some of the less troublesome details of Cloud’s account of five years ago. True; perhaps something could quench the inferno, but the town had seemed lost as Tifa ran after her father.

The strange inhabitants of their homes had put paid to doubts the fire had happened. Unfamiliar faces in every house and every shop. Denial of any friends of neighbours. Maddeningly trivial differences between memory and reality. The shoddy facsimile of home.

Hard going back. The atmosphere wrong, the black-cloaked figures seemingly harmless but unnerving. And in the depths of the town; him. They had already encountered him once, but every meeting with Sephiroth was a fresh reminder of the pain. Fortunately spared a revisit to her trauma of those years ago; the Mount Nibel Mako reactor sealed tight. “I wonder if I’m cursed. Not like Vincent, just-“ Cloud frowned.

“Cursed?”

A mirthless smile from him. “Both times I’ve gone home, it’s not ended well. Both times Sephiroth was there.” He shivered. “At least there was no fire.”

“You’re not cursed.” Tifa sought a certainty she did not feel. Some dim memory there. Of going to the mountain, into the forbidden. Of course, she had done often as an adult to no ill-effect. But- A vague hint, a sense of punishment; Mount Nibel itself had tried to destroy her once. Something feeding back into the promise. “A shame the well wasn’t there any more.”

“Yeah.” Cloud stared up to the sky. “Looked different to the one we met at that night.”

Unprompted and without a lead-in. That Cloud Strife was once her neighbour was never in question. She had not known him much but he used to be different she could certain. The man beside her was the one who promised to save her seven years ago. There remained the question of how he could know anything of Sephiroth’s previous visit, but she could take solace in his memory of home as it once was; not the bad facsimile it had become.


End file.
